Off to the races! 13 April 2008

[T]hat experience, aides say, turned Obama into both someone who identifies with those less fortunate abroad—and a true-blue patriot. “He understands he’s gotten where he is based on the fact that we have a system that opens up opportunity to smart and talented people,” says retired Air Force Gen. Merrill McPeak, a top Obama adviser. McPeak, Rhodes and others claim that Obama’s upbringing gives him deeper insight into how to win the “hearts and minds” so crucial to success in Iraq, and in the global struggle against Islamic extremism. “Obama’s experience living abroad gives him a sense of that grass-roots life, which is so important in shaping why a terrorist is a terrorist,” says Tony Lake, Bill Clinton‘s former national-security adviser, who now is a top Obama adviser. ::snip::

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It’s hot as Hades here… and I deliberated giving the blog a miss for a day or so, but then landed on this. Newsweek has done several articles on either Obama or Michelle, most longer than this. They always seem calculated to pet with the one hand and slap with the other. Oh the vagaries of running for the Leader of the Free World.

Volumes have been written about the current crisis; subprime-this, subprime that. Everything that can be said about collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) credit default swaps(CDS) and mortgage-backed securities (MBS) has already been said. Yes, they are exotic “financial innovations” and, no, they are not regulated. But what difference does that make? There’s always been snake oil and there have always been snake oil salesmen. Greenspan simply raised the bar a notch, but he’s not the first huckster and he won’t be the last. What really matters is underlying ideology; that’s the root from which this economy-busting hydra sprung. 30 years of trickle down, supply-side gibberish; 30 years of idol worship for the waxy-haired reactionary, Ronald Reagun; 30 years of unrelenting anti-labor, free market, deregulated orthodoxy which inflated the biggest equity-Zeppelin in history.

Now the bubble is hissing out of the blimp and the escaping gas is wreaking havoc across the planet. There are food riots in Haiti, Egypt, and Kuwait. Wherever the local currency is pegged to the falling dollar, inflation is soaring and trouble is brewing. Also, European banks are listing from the mortgage-backed garbage they bought from brokerages in the US and need central bank bailouts to stay afloat. It’s just more fallout from the subprime swindle. Finance ministers in every capital in every country are getting ready for a 1930’s-type typhoon that could send equities crashing and food and energy prices rocketing into the stratosphere. And it can all be traced back to the wacko doctrines of neoliberalism. These are the theories that guide America’s “screw-thy-neighbor” monetary policies and spread financial turmoil to every city and hamlet around the world.

The present stewards of the system are incapable of fixing the problem because they represent the interests of the people who benefit most from the disruptions. Paulson’s latest “blueprint” for the financial markets is a good example; a more pro-business, self-serving scheme has never been put to paper.

“There was a very self-conscious awareness that religious conservatives had brought Bush into the White House and that [the administration] wanted to do what they had been mandated to do,” says Hudson.

To conservative Catholics, that meant holding the line on same-sex marriage, euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research, and working to limit abortion in the United States and abroad while nominating judges who would eventually outlaw it. To make the case, Bush has often borrowed Pope John Paul II’s mantra of promoting a “culture of life.” Many Catholics close to him believe that the approximately 300 judges he has seated on the federal bench — most notably Catholics John Roberts and Samuel Alito on the Supreme Court — may yet be his greatest legacy. ::snip::

There is no organized political movement in this country, made up of conservative Catholics or anyone else, to nominate judges who would outlaw abortion. No justice of the Supreme Court has ever taken the view that the Court should outlaw abortion.

Emerging from a month or so of tragic deaths, professional uncertainties (then emergency overload), and other sorts of end-of-winter mayhem. Can barely stand to follow the daily dithers of the political prom-airy, at the moment, but was cheered to see this international item today:Board grants amnesty to AP photographer

BAGHDAD – An Iraqi judicial panel dismissed the last remaining criminal allegation against Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein on Sunday and ordered him released from custody, two years and one day after he was detained by the U.S. military.

(Who still have him, at Camp Cropper, apparently. So now it’s up to the US to let him go. . . .)

The AP said a review of Hussein’s work and contacts found no evidence of any activities beyond the normal role of a news photographer. Hussein was a member of an AP team that won a Pulitzer Prize for photography in 2005, and his detention has drawn protests from rights groups and press freedom advocates such as the Committee to Protect Journalists.

ms x – belated sympathies to you for the loss of Methuseleh. Wonder if Walter greeted Baby at the Purrly Gates? If so, I’m sure he’s showing her all the very best places for heavenly brunch.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^Super Addendum, too good to not pull forward, plus it gave me a laugh. From Intermittent Bystander as well:

NAPLES (Reuters) – Ballot stuffing took on a new meaning in Italy’s parliamentary election on Sunday when a man ate his ballot paper in protest at the country’s politicians.

Police in Naples said they had charged the 41-year-old businessman with destroying election materials. He said all Italian politicians and politics “are crap” and that he was protesting “against the system”.

Yeah, lc – hope the US doesn’t pull any funny business and just lets the man go.

BTW Marisa – Dubya’s going all out to kiss the papal ring, even driving out to meet him at Andrews airport, of all things. And they’ll be turning over the South Lawn to an expected crowd of 12,000 (more hoi polloi than they even had for Queen Lizzy) on Wednesday morning for the official welcome.

It will feature the U.S. and Holy See anthems, a 21-gun salute, and the U.S. Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps. Both men will make remarks before their Oval Office meeting and a send-off for his popemobile down Pennsylvania Avenue.

But yeah, apparently His Ratzitude will be too busy praying with bishops in a basilica to attend the Bavarian-themed birthday dinner George is throwing in his honor. Bunch of other “Catholic leaders” will chew the knockwurst with Dubya instead.

“She knows better. Shame on her. Shame on her,” Obama said, and then expressed some amusement at Hillary’s emergence as a tribune of the Second Amendment:

“She is running around talking about how this is an insult to sportsman, how she values the second amendment. She’s talking like she’s Annie Oakley,” Obama said, invoking the famed female sharpshooter immortalized in the musical “Anne Get Your Gun.”

Obama continued, saying “Hillary Clinton is out there like she’s on the duck blind every Sunday. She’s packing a six-shooter. Come on, she knows better. That’s some politics being played by Hillary Clinton.”

w00t. Obama plays the shame game. I doubt he’ll be eviscerated for that like Hillary was for her ‘shame on you’ moment. Hope has morphed into mockery now. Popcorn!

just watched an interview with HRC. she was milking the obama comment for everything and the last reporter asked when was the last time she shot off a gun (we all know when she should have used one and gotten probation at the most) and it wasn’t relevant! neither was the last time she went to church, though she did mention it was Easter.

BHO says she is portraying herself as Annie Oakley now.

btw, when I subscribed to the Jr. Book of the Month Club in first grade, the first selection was the story of Annie Oakley. She really did kick ass. (the illustrations in the book were much kinder to her looks)

Another volume was on Clara Barton. “Edwin lifted her off her feet” {caption under the frontispiece}

Another on Lewis & Clark, but frankly, I was more interested in the stories about the women.

CNN has their Compassion Forum tonite with Hillary and Barry. It’s on live right now, but Desperate Housewives takes precedent here! I’ll catch the rerun later (if I can stomach all of this religion talk). I may have to wear a helmet to keep my head from exploding.

Wiki tells me that Merman show musta been the 1966 revival. Ethel was no spring chicken by then, but her lungpower still beat the stageprop rifles for ear-ringing din.

Another PS for ms x – In the Year 2525 may test your homelife now, but consider thanking your stars that mr varro skipped (the contemporaneous novelty chart-buster) Gitarzan. (Or anything by Bobby Sherman, for that matter.) I think you should counter-attack with a download of The Unicorn Song .

And on the topic of musical pain, I’m pretty sure I found a secret video by DB, Lord of the Stomach Flu, the other night. (If not, apologies to the youth maligned.)

(3) Don’t ever use religion or guns as examples of comfort “blankies” — even though that’s what they’re there for. I can’t even think of safe substitutes — drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling — since you don’t want to risk the votes of overindulgers. It is a close election, after all.

I bought vanilla ice cream and root beer, since I thought a 4 yr old would be visiting today, but alas, the SIL segment of the family wanted to go to the Santa Clara county fair (in 85 degree weather!) so it is I sitting around drinking the “Black Cow”

Couple of grafs at link (KaiserFN (also links to the Boston Globe report and the NYT report):

The bill was approved Wednesday by the House Foreign Affairs Committee following meetings between White House officials and committee members earlier this week. The measure would allocate $50 billion for PEPFAR over the next five years. Bush had called on Congress to authorize a $30 billion, five-year extension of PEPFAR. The bill also would remove a requirement that at least one-third of HIV prevention funds that focus countries receive through PEPFAR be used for abstinence-until-marriage programs. It also would require “balanced funding” for abstinence, fidelity and condom programs based on evidence in each PEPFAR focus country. In addition, the bill would retain the requirement that PEPFAR recipients pledge opposition to commercial sex work.

The bill would allow groups to use PEPFAR funding for HIV testing and education in family planning clinics but not for contraception or abortion services. The bill also would require reports to Congress if abstinence and fidelity programs comprise less than half of country-level spending on programs aimed at preventing sexual transmission of the virus. In addition, the bill would allocate about $9 billion to fight tuberculosis and malaria, which often affect HIV-positive people in Africa. That amount also would underwrite food supplements for people living with HIV/AIDS. The bill would provide loans to women widowed by the disease or ostracized because of their HIV-positive status (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 2/28).

I jsut grabbed a reliable source and did not search further for current status of the bill thru the Senate, etc.
:

neither dem candidate has been a working-class stiff, but now the contest is about who is more elitist. and strangely, HRC is taking the upperhand, which is a mistake, cuz Park Ridge, Ill. is solid white suburban middle class (when it existed) and striving for more.

17 – He had very nice teeth and hair. Looks quite a bit like John Edwards in the video!

Apparently he’s still alive, and I must apologize for any impugning his character. Wiki sez:

Sherman guest-starred in several episodes of the Jack Webb series, Emergency!, and found a new calling. It was at this time that the performer focused more on his personal life, eventually leaving the public spotlight. He soon volunteered with the Los Angeles Police Department, and worked with paramedic, CPR, and first aid classes. He is also a San Bernardino County deputy sheriff. According to Sherman, “I’ve been bestowed a mountain of blessings. I felt a need to start giving back.” The entertainer has been given several awards for his humanitarian efforts.

Sherman built a one-fifth scale model of Disneyland’s Main Street, made entirely by hand in his yard at home.

BTW – was somebody trash-talking Dolly Parton here the other day? Excellent songwriter, as well as singer, with a hell of a sense of humor.

The body of missing television presenter Mark Speight was found at Paddington railway station yesterday morning. The children’s performer had disappeared following the death of his fiancee and colleague, Natasha Collins.

British Transport police said the body was found in a remote area of the station away from public view and had not been struck by a train. Speight, 42, had been missing for six days and his family had appealed in the media for him to return home.

He was said to be devastated by the experience of finding Collins, 31, dead in a scalding bath on January 3 after they had consumed cocaine, sleeping pills and alcohol at their penthouse flat. She had had a cocaine-induced heart attack and suffered 60% burns all over her body while he slept in another room.

i told a friend of mine, a long time ago, that i was too stoned. he said “no r****, you’re not stoned at all. then he said, “if you’re too stoned, you’re dead.”

And thanks for the bleak humor re Italy……Ruperts probably wringing his hands in glee that buddy Silvio will likely win………It stay’s vivid in my mind that Sharon and Berlusconi followed the Cheney/Bush inauguration in 2001 like a bad fucking omen. The chosen ones….

“DEARBORN, Mich.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee tonight condemned a brutal assault by busloads of purple cloaked staff of the Service Employees International Union who smashed into a conference of union members Saturday night in Dearborn, Mi. and physically assaulted women and union members who stood in their path. ….”

It took me a while to figure it out, but Andy Stern of SEIU is close to the Nancy P Ellen Tauscher wing. I think iirc he dabbles with the Simon Rosenberg set … the New Dems fuckers. Moulitsas, Penn etc.

Little to no hope there.

When SEUI won contracts for home health care workers in CA, I thought … well.. maybe.

All you have to do is look at the sponsosrhip. The thing drips ONE campaign (Bono is very big on PEPFAR) and Southern Baptist hoohaw.

Before we get started, on behalf of CNN and the candidates, I’d like to thank the people behind tonight’s event, Faith in Public Life, the ONE Campaign, Oxfam America, and, of course, our hosts, Messiah College.

And I’d like now to introduce my co-host. Please welcome Jon Meacham. He is the editor of Newsweek and one of America’s best-known writers of religion and matters of faith.

Years ago, I gave my stepmother a cassette of Trio – the record Dolly made with Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt – and she and my half-sis literally wore it out on a cross-country road trip, warbling along with the three-part harmonies.

Dolly’s recent collaborative effort Those Were the Days is pretty damn fun, too. This time, duets, and some of her favorite songs from the Sixties (I can hear Rev and tejano snarling off-screen already), with Kris Kristofferson, Cat Stevens, Judy Collins, et al, but also Keith Urban, Norah Jones, and Alison Krauss.

As for Dollywood and other self-spoofery, she’s a joyful master. Right up there with Keith Richards and his fishing-lure hairdos, in my book.

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Diane – thanks. Maybe “eat the vote” could be a new rallying cry?
FYI – I sent a shout-out to you and melvin both, back in December, when I noticed you here, but it was at the end of a thread, and you may have missed it at the time.

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25 – Well, you did move rather recently, right? 🙂Official fansite. Nice photo of Bobby in his deputy outfit, giving the peace sign. He looks like a good egg, and I’ll leave you to research further. (I confess, it was actually Julie Julie Julie Do Ya Love Me that put me over the edge way back when.)

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Aaargh, this comment self-destructed twice, during assembly, so I’m gonna quit now and head for snoozeland before I make it go “poof” again.

I had the great pleasure of a front-row seat to see Dolly in a rather small club several years ago. That voice is more wonderful live that it is on record, and I love many of her records. She was also incredibly charming with the crowd.

well not that I care, but in honor of my friends, women, WHO COULD knock back a shot (usually Jack Daniels with a beer back), roll a cigarette with one hand (that was just one woman admittedly, the only other smoker my mother ever admired)

I don’t know i fyou have noticed but at the sites that tie into Moulitsas, Rosenberg etal… there are ads appearing AGAINST CNA, asking who are they.

My guess Stern is moving against the CNA president Rose De Moro, they organised 4 years ago picketed and protested and brought Arnold down almost 20 pts.

Then the CA dem party took a dive on the gubernatorial race. CNA had been advised to take it lying down, they wanted raises, and other changes … It was clear is one listened closely that Stern, the CA Dem party etc is who tole them to take it lying odwn. De Moro at the time would allude that “antoher union” had told them to settle for a bad contract, that Arnold was too powerful.

I do remember the admiration McCain had for Clinton, on some Eastern european senatorial jaunt they took, and Clinton held her own with the vodka shots.

I kinda did the same today with brother the pothead. He warns me that the stuff is so good, I shouldn’t take more than one hit. I did about 3, he did 6? but then he got miserably polluted on the tequila sunrises I was pouring. he was also too chicken to get into the pool. he was up to his knees, but then told me “I don’t like the shock thing”

the SEIU/CNA thing has been simmering over at calitics for months now, although from what i can see noone there really has much of a sense about what it’s over. given their track record in stepping up when noone else bothered, and in pushing back on that romneycare healthcare mandate trojan horse that the dem leadership + ahnult was pushing, i’m pretty inclined to side with the nurses.

34 (And now I am really getting lost in this odd self-reflexive thread.) On the hares: As you may know depending on who you are (I don’t keep track), I am a member of a little forum that spun off from dkos – and that has been accused at one time or another of all sorts of heinous plans, of being a nefarious “secret cabal” dedicated to bringing dkos down for instance. My avatar there is a Scottish hare. I recently ran across a a delightful little article about them.

Not sure why you found my comment odd melvin (or did I misunderstand? now i’m getting lost), I was refering to this line in the December “wave” post IB linked to: Waves to Diane – NOLA exorcist! boxing hare! ….

IB had posted a pic in a comment at dkos a while ago refering to me as a pugilistic love bunny.

Hadn’t known you were suspected of anarchy against dkos, that was never my thought about you…. (never hung out with the frontpagers and their posse). That is a delightful link.

61 You’re either with us or against us. I wouldn’t mind it if there were some principle involved, but obviously that is not the case. when kos says it, it has all the meaning that it would coming from an advocate of the Blues and Greens of Byzantium: none at all.

Another thing about what was after all the “compassion forum”: it struck me that in response to a question about “end-of life care,” Obama came as close as he could, considering the venue, to saying “Look, you stupid fucking crackers, a sizable fraction of you at least wouldn’t treat your dog or a sick cow by the side of the road this way – keeping them alive no matter what their suffering – so why would you want to do it to your parents or your child?”

I run pretty hot on this issue because I had to pull the plug on both my parents – in observation of their written, notarized, priest- and lawyer- and family member-witnessed wishes and in the face of all sorts of opposition when it came down to it from medical establishment ghouls who wanted to keep them alive for a few more hours of misery and lucrative billing.

FT. WORTH, Tex. _American taxpayers have unwittingly helped finance a polygamist sect that is now the focus of a massive child abuse investigation in West Texas, with a business tied to the group receiving a nearly $1 million loan from the federal government and $1.2 million in military contracts.

64. Well, you have to wonder why he stayed silent on the Terry Schiavo vote when it came up. He regrets it now but what was his excuse at the time?

“It wasn’t something I was comfortable with, but it was not something that I stood on the floor and stopped,” Obama said during the debate. “And I think that was a mistake, and I think the American people understood that that was a mistake. And as a constitutional law professor, I knew better…. And I think that’s an example of inaction, and sometimes that can be as costly as action.”

I run pretty hot on this issue because I had to pull the plug on both my parents

I can’t imagine and I’m sorry to see that you had to deal with so much hassle over what should be a private and respected decision.

… and the problem is that the entire charade of Schiavo was a horror. In everyway, esp having congress enact a law for one family.

So sick of the bullshitting. Reid capitlalted immediately to the R. Michael Schiavo;s atty was very clear about how it came down.

This si an emormous issue for me… I had to fight to get liquid morphine for my father, who was at home. Instead of some pack attached to his body. THEN the dr called the DA on my mother and me. the DAs office come out to the house. The nurse from the VNA, Visiting Nursas Association accused me of being a “Possesor or Morphine” which I most certainly was. And had fought hard to get it.

67 — When I demanded that they increase my father\’s morphine drip, the nurse just said \”Oh we can\’t do that, it might suppress respiratory function.\” I pitched a regular fit a la Shirley MacLaine in Terms of Endearment, screaming and ripping shit off the walls and throwing it at them til they got a doctor over there in the middle of the night. He signed off on jacking up the morphine, and they let me go without calling the cops.

They were trying to bring mom back for the third time when I got there. I had to throw them out of the room and rip the goddamned wires off her myself. Lost whatever respect I might have had for the medical bunch that night.

I’ve also had little respect for the ‘medical bunch’ for quite a while. Far too much arrogance in that community. And far too little recognition that medicine is more art than science.

As for the morphine [with both you and Mcat], that lays more at tthe feet of the fed gov’t though. They’ve made it very difficult for doctors to effectively dispense pain meds. Yet another casualty of the drug war.

71 Well it’s just life really. The hardest thing ever, and the only choice. It’s running away from life and pretending we don’t die that is the problem, pretending professionals can in the end tell you anything about the important decisions.

That compassion forum thing. Where Obama really missed the bus was in the question about where life begins. The only legitimate answer is that there isn’t a big red line with life on one side and non-life on the other. This asparagus I’m about to eat is alive, it’s respiring, the dormant lily bulbs are stretching their roots and trying to decide whether to dig in deeper or push themselve up.

But then that would mean that people have to decide for themselves on a case-by-case basis. I mean if I were anti-choice, say, I would jettison this life crap and emphasize the human part of human life. A blastocyst or a human sperm cell for that matter is undeniably human in its essence as opposed to canine or porcine or inaminate. Doesn’t help their argument much though as you can’t save every sperm, pace Monty Python.

hmm I hated teh compassion forum. Really, they dress it up, put it on TV and try to dilute it by using “compassion” (stench of Bush) as a diversionary word, but it is a religious panel griilling the prospective noms.

I am sure Hillpac said the same, but I saw in particular Obama said he would keep the Faith based offices in the WW. he added some blither, but really, we are just yoked.

We have a hideous fully ugly inhuman state religion, morality panel, fully in place now.

Fortunately I had figured out as the years went by that no Democrat had the strength to get rid of the faith based offices. And all this silly bullshit about election day “walking around” money (what a tired prick Obama is, really). It is fully public this year, not assumed as in the past, but in print, tha tthe campaigns have sent money directly to the ministers.

I still pay attention to the game as I have reduced it to a Chinese box puzzle but really, we are finished. It is only going to get worse from here on in.

I believe Bobby Sherman actually bought and paid for the ambulance out of which he works as an EMS responder. And that was probably my Dolly Parton comments you’re remembering. As I pointed out, whatever talents she possesses have been buried under the mountain of kitsch she’s produced over the years (it’s called the Doyyhorn, and it’s located right next to Dollywood). She turned herself into a caricature to make a ton of money. Fine, she’s entitled, but that means she foregoes being respected as a serious artist.

My grandmother died at home (under home hospice care, briefly) 13 years ago last month. Ovarian cancer. She was on a fentanyl patch for a while. At the very end she was given morphine. My impression was that the hospice workers had much more of an attitude of knowing full well the morphine was going to depress respiration in a way that would make her both comfortable and shorten her survival (although that wasn’t the intention). I recall it being spoken about matter-of-factly.

Marisa, was this hospice care in your situation, or was it just a visiting nurse unaffiliated with a hospice program?

As I grow older I become more convinced that “modern” medical care is mostly a fairy tale and that the medical establishment actively breeds stupidity. When my grandmother was in the hospital for the final time (after yet another surgery to relieve fluid retention, this was the part where she was just going to be taken home for good), some small herd of med students was brought in to stare at her. Now my grandmother was one of those people who are not ever going to admit they’re dying, she always said “I gotta get well” right up to the end. But these med students just gawked at her and kept prompting her to “discuss her fears and feelings about dying” and she was getting seriously confused at what they wanted from her, and fortunately they left before I had the chance to physically drag them out the door and knock their stupid heads together. I wanted to scream at them “She’s not ever going to admit she’s dying, ‘kay? Deal with it.”

In that instance, with my father in ’87, it was VNA sent thru the doctor/hospital, covered under medicare. She clearly answered to the doctor. It was when she was on the phone to him in our house that the phrase “possessor of morphine” was used. The dr had called in a script to our family pharmcy for a morphine pack. I absolutely was not going ot have him die with some thing attached to him. It took me two days but I got a large bottle of liquid morphine. Instead, I never accepted the morphine pack.

Then they rigamarole began, it seems ouyr pharmacist should not have given me the switch. I could see he was in a panic. So I went home, took the bottle, a big old fashioned brown glass bottle and left the house.

I called the dr from a bar /restaurant near our house, Alta Plaza, it was mid afternoon. There was a pay phone on a little landing over the bar. I demanded a SECOND bottle (which I got). When I was done the gay fellows in the bar stood up and applauded. It was in the middle of the 15 years or so of HIV (or whatever the core illness is) deaths in SF.

But the day he died (about 4 days later), the dr took his revenge. Called the DA. Who actually did come out to the house. But he took our side. I heard him on the phone too… he mentioned that not even were my father’s lips dry, the care had been so good and he would not trouble two grieving women anymore.

We had an LVN in the house, who did not answer to the dr, tho the VNA nurse treated her as an orderly.. I took most of my tips from her.

It was only marginally better 10 years later, with Hospice for my mother, also at home.

it is why the law in OR is so important. But tethered as we are to the State and the State Religion, I doubt we ever get truly compassionate informed care.

Oh I am fully done with the medical profession, but for the small number who remain human. Horrible people, for the most part.. It is all about profit in the US. And power.

60
melvin, I realized I was second or lower class at dkos after a toe to toe with “DrainBamaged,” who tried to veil his quite obvious disdain for females, by playing on something truly tragic that happened to him. I guess he got a little too used to never being questioned due to his wounds. And don’t let me start about that ‘Golden’ prick without gills, in the teeny, water filled glass bowl …………………and the Tiger King….of Norway, or whereever the fuck………………….

What really pissed me off were the amount of females who went after me like rabid dogs or sniffed around me, as if I was ‘unclean’………….. ya’d think they’d think twice and read between the lines….

Very sorry to hear about what must have been a really awful experience as regards your Mom and Dad….sometimes, folks need to remember that once popular phrase about walking in someone else’s shoes before they open their big ugly mouth, letting all the flies out………

the amount of females who went after me like rabid dogs or sniffed around me, as if I was ‘unclean’………….. ya’d think they’d think twice and read between the lines…. — diane

Oh no that is the sevice class of female over at Dkos (and elsewhere).

As I wrote at LSF in the wake of Pie Wars, “more than legs will be spread at Dkos”.

And don’t get me started on the Service Class of gays over at Dkos. From DD in his closet to Musing85 to GregNYC and on and on.

In the end, it was all very reflective of the PARTY. That would be the flea covered carcass that advertises itself as a national political party. Demands votes and claims to be able to something, anything. But they never can find the door knob on the door, much less do anything real.

oh an on ‘unclean’, i like to repeat that in a thread DHinMI said it was ok for Joan (legs always spread I guess) to be a FPer, as “she has had her distemper shots”. She treated it like a joke. She was in the thread.

I was extremely underwhelmed by his response to the torture question last nite. Very detached and using the ‘the US does not torture’ line. Guess what, Obama? Yes, it does. And if he doesn’t try to overturn congress’ vote (MCA act) that gave the CIA torturers immunity from prosecution if he is prez, then we’ll know where he really stands.

Jesus, the media at least asked Wesley Clark about the School of the Americas… I realise it was pertinent as he had served there (loved all the excuses by his tiny sub set of beloveds and operatives online) but really it is an issue for anyone running for the president. And Fort Huachuca as well.

‘Don’t torture’. What bullshit. It seems a 50/50 (at best) shot he can make it past the old white crazy guy, but if he does, it will be an interesting day, when we bomb Africans with a bi racial president. And a black general running AFRICOM.

Why anything should change, no reason. PTB just line up the ducks they need, at a given time.

Rachel Maddow is making an ass of herself on David Gregory’s show – blaming the media for Obama’s bittergate gaffe. I don’t often agree with Scarborough but he got it right when he replied that this isn’t about the media coverage – it’s about peoples’ perceptions as they relate to Dems being “elitist” for decades now.

Plenty of racism and sexism in this race, but if the black contender cannot be criticised for being an asshole (and that is a perception)… when the white woman is openly criticised for being a bitch, that too a perception…

he was far too fragile for this run, imo. His passive / aggressive stances undermine his run, again in my opinion…. And I formed that opinion some time ago.

Since I have already been called a racist, (and a homophobe) I surely do not care.

Plenty of racism and sexism in this race, but if the black contender cannot be criticised for being an asshole (and that is a perception)… when the white woman is openly criticised for being a bitch, that too a perception…

Agreed but there’s something particularly galling about Matthews, “Little Russ,” and David Gregory, all pampered msm pundits with 7 figure salaries criticizing anybody for being elitist.

If there were any justice in the world, Chris Matthews would get mugged by a couple of white trash methheads in small town Pennsylvania and wind up on his knees begging for his life.

What I think happened was that the Democrats took a gamble. They didn’t want to impeach or oppose Bush on the war but they had to find some way of keeping “the left” inside the party.

So they served up identity politics. What leftist would not vote for the Democratic ticket if it had an African American or a woman at the head of the ticket.

They were also counting on the Republican opponent, Rudy, McCain, Romney, as being too weak to mount any challenge.

The problem is that the lack of an impeachment hearing, the legalization of torture, the NSA spying, all of it has devalued the office of the president. So now that it’s devalued they can chuck it to a black man or a white women.

I don’t think it’s Hillary personally who’s splitting the party this Spring. I think it’s the party that’s splitting itself. If they’re not going to impeach Bush, or oppose him on torture or the war, then they’ve sent the message. Ethics means nothing and winning means everything. It’s a free for all.

I mean, if YOU KNOW that you’re giving up your principles to take the White House, if you’re ignoring torture, civil liberties, the rule of law and hardening yourself to the point we’re you’re willing to DO ANYTHING.

Then you’ll do anything. The party splits into a gang of squabbling little egotists willing to stab one another in the back.

No skin off my back. They lost me in May of 2007 when they voted to fund the war. But I’m not really enjoying watching it all play out. It’s disgusting me.

. . . while White supporters of his candidacy want Obama to be the answer to getting many of the more progressive elements of the American African population to be quiet, his church membership and close relationship to a liberation theology preacher has also gone on to make many if not all Whites to some degree feel uneasy about what the African population in this country really might be thinking about our experience with genocidal White rule in the United States.

I find the latter to be quite humourous given that historically neither Africans nor First Nations peoples have ever “taken revenge” for more than 500 years of mistreatment. If anything, we have embraced and protected the White population and by our sacrifices made this entity possible. In return we have received little but more struggle for our own basic human rights, something White America has fought us against tooth and nail. To worry about how we might regard that history in our hearts and homes not only proves the notion that there exists several “Americas” in the United States, but that these divisions are primarily reflections of the fears of the White majority of what would happen if the power dynamics were to ever change.

It would just be nice for once if the White population were willing to be honest about it. It is their own fears, not our anger that created the divisions they speak of. It is easier, our elders tell us, to trust the Devil that you know rather than the Devil that you don’t know as well.

yes pretty much. As I have said win lose or draw the run was to consolidate the black vote for the Dems. It has been a runing debate for years who would field the first Black Veep.

O sure the party is under stress, from two factions of centrists. the muddled left will go on voting, right as rain on election day. And say Thank You.

Axelrod has been incubating this sort of run for years. Perhaps, even for the US political scene, a tad too calculating. And sloppy, which is more dangerous.

The joke is sort of on him. Media is quietly warming up to report on full implosion of Deval… and FOX loves to run daily updates on Kwame in Detroit. Who really is one more patronage lunatic. But it builds a scenario.

Axelrod and Plouffe seemed to think this was going to be like taking candy from a dead person.

When I first started on this, I thought “oh no, another Hedges-like attack on “fundamentalist” Atheism”, but it’s actually pretty good:

American evangelical Christianity is a perverse thing, much of it demonstrably extrabiblical if not outright contradictory of scripture. Arguably, this is because it’s not about God; rather, religion is simply the only philosophical (or, if you will, mythic) language available to some Americans to articulate their discontent and their visions of social change. The Dawkins/Hitchens question—What’s wrong with religion?—is far less illuminating than the question they might have asked: What are American evangelicals really talking about when they talk about religion? Following Tom Frank’s argument in What’s the Matter with Kansas?, I believe that Christian fundamentalism, American style (like its Islamic counterpart in the extremist madrasahs of the East and the Middle East), uses religion to articulate the social, political, and economic discontent and utopian fantasies of a certain segment of American society. It does so because religion is the explanatory narrative and metaphoric language that segment has used, throughout American history, to make sense of the social changes taking place around it. As well, religion has been that class’s primary mode of public address in American culture.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that it’s not a hell of a lot of fun to mock.

First chance to get back to the thread since last night, so apologies for delay or further reflexivity here. . .

Marisa and Melvin – Retroactive sympathies for your horrifying travails with end-of-life caregiving, and all respect for your determination to do for your loved ones as they needed and wished, despite condescending bullshit and active interference from the medical powers that be.

One of the tragic deaths affecting my world last month (and I should clarify, none were my own family members) was the untimely demise of a 75-year-old. She was one of those seemingly indefatigable, indestructible, super-dynamic people that others always call “vibrant.” A widow and former inner-city teacher, she was still madly busy with anti-hunger, environmental, and humanist groups, still hale and hiking and swimming every chance she got, still painting and potting, still dispensing bone-crushing hugs and contentious opinions wherever she went. But her one great fear, despite her laughs about becoming “a little old lady,” was her terror of gradual incapacitation and physical dependency.

As it turned out, she tripped on rough pavement while jaywalking (on her way to a life drawing class in the city) and was struck by a car whose driver never even saw her, and she was dragged down the street before he fully knew. She wasn’t killed instantly, was awake while witnesses and then EMTs worked to get the car off of her, and she was rushed to hospital, alone, where she died by nightfall. Her family members got the news via voice mails from police.

Days later, as her stunned sons sat shivah, they all found some comfort in the fact that she had, at least, avoided the long-dreaded miseries of geriatric care.

Well it’s just life really. The hardest thing ever, and the only choice. It’s running away from life and pretending we don’t die that is the problem, pretending professionals can in the end tell you anything about the important decisions.

Yes.

JJB – re Dolly – I guess I just don’t agree. I’m pretty willing to take artists “seriously” as long as they continue to make their art with care and soul and “seriousness.” If they happen to wear ridiculous clothes, or take up outlandish hobbies, or develop a sideline biz with a goofy theme park (BTW – presumably offering some economic benefit to the rural area from whence they came), I could care less. She’s not manufacturing warheads, directing snuff films, or running a chain of puppy mills, after all. No doubt I’ll think of an exception to my broad-mindedness on this point, but the only exceptions I can think of are artists whose “real” work turned vain or lazy and sold out to shlock.

Diane – yep, those were the boxing bunnies I meant. (The Thai boxers I referenced there were probably related to a flower garland theme Marisa had going, at the time.) Glad you enjoyed the analogy, however bizarre. And thanks for the Scottish link, Melvin – I’d never realized those hares lived in nests! Fantastic.

For days, Bruce Barclay’s political career hung in the balance. The Republican commissioner of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, had been accused of rape — by a man, no less — and the police were bearing down. Barclay’s lawyer issued a strong denial (“This accusation of rape is ludicrous It will be defended forever and is wrong.”). But it was clear things were looking pretty dicey. Until… vindication! Well, sort of.

On March 31st, police, investigating the allegation of rape by the 20-year old Marshall McCurdy, obtained a warrant to search Barclay’s home. They didn’t find evidence of rape. But they did find videotapes of hundreds of sexual encounters with men that Barclay had filmed on high-tech surveillance cameras. The cameras were hidden inside AM/FM radios, motion detectors and intercom speaker systems, among other places. There was also one at his business office.

None of the subjects were aware they were being filmed and no permission had been obtained, Barclay admitted. According to a second warrant issued on April 9th, Barclay also admitted to hiring prostitutes on a weekly basis from the now-defunct website harrisburgfratboys.com.

Thanks, MCat. Apparently the cops checked her cell phone to figure out who to notify, and the first call they made was to an elderly relative somewhere in Florida, who was pretty well befuddled by it all. Eventually her sons were found, and yeah, they were all shattered.

Not sure anyone thought she, of all people, was really mortal.

But we all are.

The memorial service helped them a lot, I think. Big turnout, wildly diverse crowd, lots of heartfelt and funny testimonials.

I don’t agree that Gregory was bordering on “uppity”. The fact is that Obama is arrogant and cocky – aren’t all politicians? To somehow turn that observation into a near-racist smear is to ignore that they all have ginormous egos. This isn’t about his skin colour. It’s about his behaviour.

Yes, guys like this pick on other men’s books too, and people of both genders pop up at events to hold forth on irrelevant things and conspiracy theories, but the out-and-out confrontational confidence of the totally ignorant is, in my experience, gendered. Men explain things to me, and other women, whether or not they know what they’re talking about. Some men.

Every woman knows what I’m talking about. It’s the presumption that makes it hard, at times, for any woman in any field; that keeps women from speaking up and from being heard when they dare; that crushes young women into silence by indicating, the way harassment on the street does, that this is not their world. It trains us in self-doubt and self-limitation just as it exercises men’s unsupported overconfidence.

I wouldn’t be surprised if part of the trajectory of American politics since 2001 was shaped by, say, the inability to hear Coleen Rowley, the FBI woman who issued those early warnings about al-Qaeda, and it was certainly shaped by a Bush administration to which you couldn’t tell anything, including that Iraq had no links to al-Qaeda and no WMDs, or that the war was not going to be a “cakewalk.” (Even male experts couldn’t penetrate the fortress of their smugness.)

Arrogance might have had something to do with the war, but this syndrome is a war that nearly every woman faces every day, a war within herself too, a belief in her superfluity, an invitation to silence, one from which a fairly nice career as a writer (with a lot of research and facts correctly deployed) has not entirely freed me. After all, there was a moment there when I was willing to let Mr. Important and his overweening confidence bowl over my more shaky certainty.

Don’t forget that I’ve had a lot more confirmation of my right to think and speak than most women, and I’ve learned that a certain amount of self-doubt is a good tool for correcting, understanding, listening, and progressing — though too much is paralyzing and total self-confidence produces arrogant idiots, like the ones who have governed us since 2001. There’s a happy medium between these poles to which the genders have been pushed, a warm equatorial belt of give and take where we should all meet.

It does so because religion is the explanatory narrative and metaphoric language that segment has used, throughout American history, to make sense of the social changes taking place around it. As well, religion has been that class’s primary mode of public address in American culture.

Lafollette… Bryan… American economic left populism had a very strict religious bent in this country before Marxism started to take hold. And it has elsewhere as well. Far be it from me to praise any element associated with Catholicism, but liberation theology is, I think, something to be respected, and very much a central core of the leftism in Latin America. And again, as much as it pains me, the majority of voices in the civil rights movement were black evangelicals… and Alice Paul was a devout Quaker… and…

While I personally dismiss the notion of equality as a religious notion, and view it as a rational one, and I am anti-religious because of the hideous history, present and future that continued belief in religion offers us as humanity, I also recognize that, for whatever reason, religion brings some to a recognition of equality. And that recognition I’ll accept from whatever quarter.

I’m not unconvinced that my own inclination in that diretion wasn’t influenced by liberation theology, or black southern baptists in some way, though I now comprehend it in an entirely different manner.

Re: Bobby Sherman: I think he only showed up once or twice on Emergency, as a “guest star”. The real hottie from that show was Randy Mantooth. He’s still something special, even after all these years.

It was funny to see Kevin Tighe, his easygoing partner, showing up in John Sayles movies (e.g., Matewan, City of Hope) as a venal, brutish thug. And doing it well.

Re: medical professionals and dying relatives: I’ve seen this from several different sides, including seeing my parents dying (my mother quick, my father slow and administratively inconvenient) and seeing friends having to pull the plug on significant others. In all cases I’ve seen incredible gallantry and kindness on the part of the professionals involved, and I’ve also seen staggering ineptitude and harshness. For the most part, the negative side is inspired/imposed by the medical bureaucracy. People are deathly afraid of being sued – or encountering the demented mindset that wants to eliminate the option of euthanasia.

In this thread there has been discussion of inhumane attitudes toward pain relief. There has also been discussion of hostile attitudes towards women, especially women in authority. It’s worth bearing in mind that both these viewpoints are – as they have been throughout history – aided and abetted by our dominant religion of Christianity. It’s hard to believe now, but it used to be a big controversial issue to give women anesthetic to relieve the pains of childbirth – after all, the Bible said that women must give birth in pain and sorrow! We have a stubborn Scot to thank for arguing against this medieval view and having the guts to persevere: Sir James Young Simpson.

IB – so sorry to hear of your travails lately. Whatever happened to real ‘police notification’… then again, with our current police, I’m not really sure if I’d want them showing up at my door to inform me that a loved one had died.

But as melvin said above, its the avoidance of death that causes the problem, and it sounds to me that your friend was never avoiding death, but living her life, to the end. And that is to be celebrated.

Re: 121, lucid: well if you could explain to me how “liberation theology” is a product of Catholicism itself and not an innovative action by some socially-aware activists who happened to start out Catholic, then we would have something.

Also, Quakerism is not at all like black evangelicalism or Catholicisim.

In my opinion, the impulse toward egalitarianism sprung up as the influence of state-imposed religion waned. The Age of Enlightenment involved dumping the overbearing religious wackos, of whatever flavor, and using one’s own reason instead. The recent upsurge of religious wackoness coincides with the general downturn of rationality.

Just wanted to add: I don’t care much for Hillary, but I do love that story/photo of her knocking back the scotch-and-beer with the working stiffs. She goes up a notch in my estimatiion. Somehow I can’t see Pelosi mascara-and-pearls doing that. Yes, it’s all Acting, but it’s instructive who gravitates to the different roles. Hillary has taken the hardass bitch role and is now inhabiting it. With silly stuff like drinking with the guys, she can soften those edges and become a “man’s woman”. She should look to this for inspiration:

Well, I sort of can. Liberation theology comes directly from the Catholic theological tenet of ‘good works’, as opposed to the protestant ‘faith alone’. In the former salvation is envisioned as, god, WWJD, in the short form, but seriously looking at the Gospels [all of them – not just the ‘Roman approved’ versions] and envisioning a moral life in which one acts according to the tenets outlined – defense of the poor, the downtrodden, the disempowered and revolutionary vigor for bringing down the entrenched interests [of both power and aristocracy – i.e. the Jewish priesthood (the pharisees) and Rome]. I don’t believe ‘Jesus’ ever existed, but I do think there were a host of charismatic leaders at the time that were disgusted with both the capitulation of the Jewish aristocracy to Rome and Rome itself, most specifically on econoimc issues. And, from my experiences speaking with Latin Amercian Priests as a child [most of whom came through my home town regularly due to the existence of Notre Dame], that’s pretty much where they were coming from.

And while I know Quakerism is unlike any other version of Christianity [I did after all attend a Quaker college], the core of Quakerism is the same as much of the black Evangelicism that spurred on the civil rights movement and the Catholicism present in much of Latin America – they all believe in economic equality. Granted I have serious problems with the latter two incarnations when it comes to women, and a problem of the first when it comes to race [the Quakers had historical issues there for quite a while – including Alice Paul].

And I’m not defending any of them. I was just elaborating on a point in a quoted piece from MitM about how the religious experience has shaped this country politically, and throwing in my two cents about how it might have shaped me as well… despite my own atheism.

I was just elaborating on a point in a quoted piece from MitM about how the religious experience has shaped this country politically, and throwing in my two cents about how it might have shaped me as well… despite my own atheism.

I think it only shaped me in the sense that negative space can help outline a picture. I find that I enjoy a lot of religious literature, architecture and art, but in the same way that I enjoy any mythology or old products of other people. It is a way that people sublimate their own creative selves by making things or beliefs in honor of, or inspired by some higher outside force because they’re too self-loathing to accept that THEY, people, are the real creative force, the only “god” that there is. Sometimes they are creative for good, for beauty … or for ill, for some ugly hatred or fear.

This small Saskatchewan farmer took on Monsanto and achieved a partial victory. It was quite the fight.

Schmeiser pleased with victory over Monsanto
In an out of court settlement finalized on March 19, 2008, Percy Schmeiser has settled his lawsuit with Monsanto. Monsanto has agreed to pay all the clean-up costs of the Roundup Ready canola that contaminated Schmeiser’s fields. Also part of the agreement was that there was no gag-order on the settlement and that Monsanto could be sued again if further contamination occurred. Schmeiser believes this precedent setting agreement ensures that farmers will be entitled to reimbursement when their fields become contaminated with unwanted Roundup Ready canola or any other unwanted GMO plants.

This ties into what I mentioned yesterday… at the tied in blahgs [to Moulitsas. Rosenberg, SEIU, NDN, NPI, etc] ads are appearing against CNA…[they only support single payer, protested and agitated, brought Arnold down almost 20 pts in the polls.. only to have the Dem party SEUI big dem fundraisers throw the election]

JJB posted today that Atrios had a “duh uhh mm zzz” post on it. So tired of the dumbshits.

It is a way that people sublimate their own creative selves by making things or beliefs in honor of, or inspired by some higher outside force because they’re too self-loathing to accept that THEY, people, are the real creative force, the only “god” that there is.

I wholeheartedly agree, but I guess what I am saying is, that even though I came to the same quasi-Kantian/Nietzschean beliefs on my own in my late teens/early 20’s, I cannot deny that I got there partially because of the religion to which I was exposed [and devoutly believed] in my youth. Believe me – this isn’t an exhortation to religiously indoctinate of youth, I’m simply saying that I can identify with some of the quoted portions of the article you linked, because it is, for better or worse, part of my own experience.

While all religion makes me vomit [literally], I won’t say to someone who believes in equality because of their experience of religion that they aren’t right, or not worthy of joining with me in whatever quests toward social justice we can mount together. Take a person like Father Berrigan. I cannot deny his commitment to peace and social justice was motivated principally by his understanding of Catholicism. I disagree profoundly with his church and his religious belief [not to mention I have no doubt he was anti-choice], but I admire and support everything he did in his life against war, the death penalty, torture, The School of the Americas, nuclear arms, etc.

And I can’t deny that this brand of Christianity in some ways inspired me as a child – moved me in the right direction – helped me to understand the greater issues of social justice.

In my opinion, the impulse toward egalitarianism sprung up as the influence of state-imposed religion waned. The Age of Enlightenment involved dumping the overbearing religious wackos, of whatever flavor, and using one’s own reason instead. The recent upsurge of religious wackoness coincides with the general downturn of rationality.

I would disagree wholeheartedly, and we have discussed why in the past. The impulse toward egalitarianism is present in many anceint religions, and only wound it’s way into the west through the enlightenment rediscovery of ancient texts. The impulse towards egalitarianism is present in Aeschylus, the Sophists, most notably [with respect ot women] Sophocles. It couldn’t be accepted politically, hence Plato/Judaism and the 2100 years that followed – at least in the west… and the 500 that have followed that are still a pale cry in my opinion.

CREON
Why, then, dost thou render a grace that is impious in his sight?

ANTIGONE
The dead man will not say that he so deems it.

CREON
Yea, if thou makest him but equal in honour with the wicked.

ANTIGONE
It was his brother, not his slave, that perished.

The entire play reads like this… an appeal to fundamental equality, no less one in which a daughter stands up to the king to fight for this idea. Hegel reads it as the fundamental reason for the collapse of Greek culture. I read it as one of the most important feminist texts ever written…

It never stops with Monsanto. In the area of gene insertions into potato they have tried to patent entire processes alreay widely in use, threatened U of Montana with a ridiculous lawsuit over this. No merit whatsoever, but universities don’t have a corps of high price lawyers in their back pocket for stuff like this.

That is in this country, so you can imagine what they get away with elsewhere. Far and away the worst corporate citizen in the world.

LOL Please jesus, if I am ever in trouble let Bob Casey and his lisp not be arguing for me… Charlie Rose doing damage control for ObamaRama. Which he has famously done for righties, wingers, the war, neocons and others of that ilk.

Along they way htey play a segment from his 2004 appearance on Rose, which I had seen. And was underwhelmed. The snip they use is him describing a small, vanishing industrial base, town in Illinois. He did the same damn thing. An OK opening phrase, sympathetic, non-stereotypical, but then he talked about how the men go hunting to remember times with their fathers and the women go to church to maybe remember being with Grandma.

Comments on dailykos.com became so furious that one poster suggested that readers let Ms. Fowler off the hook. “No,” someone else responded, “if we let her go, others will do it… We’ve got to show the ‘journalist’ that they can’t manufacture dissent. This isn’t about Obama, this could easily be a story about Iraq or Iran. This is the type of disingenuous reporting that we have to stop. We need to make an example of her.”

(my emphasis)

Make an example of her to who, exactly? She’s a HuffPo blogger for craps’ sake. They think so much of themselves over there. It’s beyond ridiculous.

We’re having fun in the great white north here today. The military spokespuppet for the CDN military in Afghanistan, General Rick Hillier (a real bastard), is stepping down and (in an unrelated story) the Tory’s headquarters has been raided by the RCMP due to an Elections Canada complaint. Woohoo. CDN popcorn makers are all ablaze!

Six prizes are awarded every year, one each to a grassroots environmental activist from: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South and Central America.

For 2008:

North AmericaJesús León Santos, 42, Mexico: In Oaxaca, where unsustainable land-use practices have made it one of the world’s most highly-eroded areas, León initiated a land renewal program that employs ancient indigenous practices to transform depleted soil into arable land.

AfricaFeliciano dos Santos, 43, Mozambique: Using traditional music, grassroots outreach and innovative technology to bring sanitation to the most remote corners of Mozambique, Santos empowered villagers to participate in sustainable development and rise up from poverty.(His band, Massukos)

AsiaMarina Rikhvanova, 46, Russia: As Russia expands its petroleum and nuclear interests, Rikhvanova campaigned to protect Siberia’s Lake Baikal, one of the world’s most important bodies of fresh water, from environmental devastation brought on by these polluting industries.(Baikal Environmental Wave)

South & Central AmericaPablo Fajardo Mendoza andLuis Yanza, 35 & 48, Ecuador: In the Ecuadorian Amazon, Fajardo and Yanza led one of the largest environmental legal battles in history against oil giant Chevron, demanding justice for the massive petroleum pollution in the region.(Much in the news recently over the CNN Hero flap, Greg Palast has written extensively about Fajardo and his struggle against DKos sugardaddy Chevron as well.)

EuropeIgnace Schops, 43, Belgium: Raising more than $90 million by bringing together private industry, regional governments, and local stakeholders, Schops led the effort to establish Belgium’s first and only national park, protecting one of the largest open green spaces in the country.

Islands & Island NationsRosa Hilda Ramos, 63, Puerto Rico: In the shadow of polluting factories in Cataño, Ramos led the movement to permanently protect the Las Cucharillas Marsh, one of the last open spaces in the area and one of the largest wetlands ecosystems in the region.

I’ve had it on my mind for a while that SOMEONE is snatching up acres and acres of rural land in third world countries as Global Corporations (philanthropist$ that they are) set up fortress in these countries luring folks into cities with promises of a better life.

When these companies find even cheaper labor elsewhere, those folks are stuck in a bleak, likely highly polluted city (since we’ve exported our pollution along with our manufacturing jobs), left with far less, than what they previously had. They can’t even grow their own food anymore, and may not even be able to put a roof over their heads.

What the fuck good is their new computer or cell phone then? They can’t eat it and likely can’t pay the utilities to charge it up, nor the monthly rates for an isp or a cell phone.

Speaking of technology, The Tech is Green equation drives me fuckin nuts, never hear anyone talking about acres upon acres of land devoted to server farms (which the corporate lords are now demanding enormous, and ultimately economy crippling tax breaks for) and sucking up WATER and ENERGY… or the fact that virtually all of the millions of tech gadgets have to be juiced up)

“To put it another way, in 2005 it took the equivalent of 14, 1,000-megawatt power plants to keep online the world’s data centers owned by Internet giants like Google (GOOG), Microsoft (MSFT) and Yahoo (YHOO). Server farms in the United States alone consumed enough electricity to keep five of those monster power plants running around the clock. And that was before the explosion of online video and the use of the Internet as a global telephone service. “You can imagine there be will be substantial improvements in the operation of data centers in the next five years, but you can also can imagine there will many new applications coming out leading to demand for servers we didn’t expect,” ….”

Odd, the link in the above comment, 167, has to be pasted in the address bar, then it will work. If you want to read the piece, remove the space after “http:” in the following link and paste it in your address bar:

Catnip – it’s long been known that extensive supplementation with A and E are not good for one’s health – same with beta carotene [there was a French study a while back showing that beta carotene supplements increased the risk of cancer in smokers]. However, it has been shown repeatedly that a diet of whole foods rich in all three is extremely good for one and promotes health.

As for C and selenium – well it also has been repeatedly demonstrated that supplementation with these nutrients strongly imrpoves the health of those suffering from inflammatory conditions [RA, Lupus, Fibromyalgia, etc.]. Most immune/inflammatory disease suffers struggle from a depressed glutathione metabolism of which selenium is a central component. So what is claimed in that article with respect to the latter two is patently bogus.

So.

One of the participants in the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville was a man named Peter Tefft. He was outed by the Twitter group "Yes, You're Racist," which had been posting screenshots of participants in an effort to expose them. His father, Pearce Tefft, has come out and publicly denounced his white supremacist son in an open letter […]

Heather Heyer is the latest casualty in a number of deaths at the hands of white nationalists. Foreign Policy recently published an FBI and Department of Homeland Security bulletin that concluded white supremacist groups were "responsible for 49 homicides in 26 attacks from 2000 to 2016...more than any other domestic extremist movement." Despite th […]

As President Trump faces growing outrage over his response to the deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, we bring you an exclusive: an interview with the great-great-grandsons of Confederate General Stonewall Jackson. At least 1,500 symbols of the Confederacy can be found in public spaces across the country. But now a number of the monu […]

In a wide ranging discussion, Nina Turner and Paul Jay focus on the role of Trump, the GOP, corporate Democrats and corporate media in perpetuating systemic racism; they also address whether Nazi's should have a right to organize public rallies

Ecuador's former president Rafael Correa is accusing recently elected president Lenin Moreno of moving the country to the right, using corruption accusations against Vice-President and Correa friend Jorge Glas as cover. TRNN's Greg Wilpert reports

BRIDGEWATER, N.J./WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Thursday decried the removal of monuments to the pro-slavery Civil War Confederacy, echoing white nationalists and drawing stinging rebukes from fellow Republicans in a controversy that has inflamed racial tensions.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump has stepped up his attacks on Republican senators, an approach he may regret if he is someday impeached and the Senate has to weigh charges against him stemming from an investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has abandoned plans to create an infrastructure advisory council, the White House said on Thursday, the day after two other advisory groups were dismantled over the furor caused by Trump's remarks on white supremacists.

(Reuters) - Wisconsin's Republican-controlled state Assembly voted 59-30 on Thursday to approve a bill that paves the way for a $3 billion incentives package for a proposed liquid-crystal display plant by Taiwan's Foxconn.

Media

from Howl

I'm with you in Rockland
where we wake up electrified out of the coma
by our own souls' airplanes roaring over the
roof they've come to drop angelic bombs the
hospital illuminates itself imaginary walls collapse
O skinny legions run outside O starry
spangled shock of mercy the eternal war is
here O victory forget your underwear we're free
I'm with you in Rockland
in my dreams you walk dripping from a sea-
journey on the highway across America in tears
to the door of my cottage in the Western night

October 7 1955

"a remarkable collection of angelson one stage reading their poetry"
"I think Allen Ginsberg standing up there reading - putting himself on the line - was one of the two bravest things I've ever seen. Remember, it was '55. People had crew cuts, and they looked at you like you were misplaced cannon fodder. The country was being run by Luce publications. It was a dangerous, cold, ugly time, and it was scary. . .
In all our memories no one had been so outspoken in poetry before. We had gone beyond a point of no return. None of us wanted to go back to the grey, chill, militaristic silence, to the intellectual void - to the land without poetry - to the spiritual drabness. We wanted to make it new and we wanted to invent it and the process of it as we went into it. We wanted voice and we wanted vision."
-Michael McClure

Democrats…

Same as goddam fucking forever.
Over and over, in election year after election year, GE and MidTerms both… the Dems start to purr and preen, they stretch luxuriously - at just being TOLD they are going to win [...]
It never fails.
... in February of 2002, looking over the already joyless congressional stragglers willing to be drafted for duty… they barely dreamed, yet, it was even possible (Howard, a different person then, had not arrived to say it could be done)… but one thing was clear, we could not rely on the party to swing it. Could not. You could smell it, they would screw the deal. And I am not talking about Howard and primary issues here. By the end, that was a passing political story. Chuck it on the heap.
[...]
Upshot? The Republicans make it thru. They hold on.